A very musical weekend
Share with others:
I suppose you're wondering what BlueNotes did with his weekend. Well, OK, but I'm not that easily deterred.
On Thursday, I picked up a last-minute ticket for a back-row seat to the Bob Dylan/Elvis Costello concert at the Peterson in Oakland. It was an interesting pairing and an excellent show (see colleague Scott Mervis' fine review).
I was more interested in seeing Dylan, but Costello is a great singer/songwriter, and his solo acoustic set was riveting.
And of course, Dylan has a few bluesy roots that still show every once in a while, even though it gets harder to pick them out of his never-ending, ever-changing musical metamorphisis. They do show up on albums, though, like "Rollin' and Tumblin'," from "Modern Times."
But it was fun to see Dylan, and watch him work his way through a set, without stories or patter, stopping only once to introduce the band, in a voice that seemed not to come from the man who had been growling the lyrics.
And BlueNotes, being fond of bands that look like bands, loved the grey suits for the band, and Dylan's black outfit with white hat. I wonder who decides that?
What I'm not real fond of, though, is the large concert experience. I know, it's a communal celebration as much as it is a musical event, but I still go actually hear the music, which includes the words. And big halls make it hard to hear, since I'm too cheap and too disorganized to spring for the front-row seats before anyone else gets in line.
And maybe I've been spoiled by being able to sit or stand just a few feet from some of the world's greatest bluesmen in small clubs.
Anyway, it was worth the effort to see one of the greatest American songwriters.
At least I think it was a Dylan concert. I didn't smell any pot.
Then Friday night, it was back to the small clubs, this time Moondog's, to hear the big-voiced soulful blues of Shemekia Copeland.
At 28, she already singing powerful songs with her lusty, rafter-rattling vocals, and her band was tight and funky behind her.
She opened with "Breaking Out," which is just what she's been doing for the last few years, recording albums and winning blues awards.
She's almost a Moondog's regular, and bantering with the crowd almost within arm's reach makes for a completely different kind of musical experience than the big concert. But I guess I can't expect Dylan to show up at Moondog's.
There were a couple of interesting numbers in the set -- on one Shemekia was accompanied only by her guitarist on a little acoustic gem that I think is titled "Beat Up Old Guitar." Later there was a kind of anti-rap rap from a song titled "Who Stole My Radio," from one who thinks her music deserves more airtime. Which it does.
It might be worth mentioning that this was a no-smoking show, which it seems more performers are requesting these days in club shows. Now you can actually see them.
Saturday night it was back to Moondog's to see long-time Pittsburgh blue-eyed soul guy Billy Price, who I had not seen for a long time, and who sounds better than ever.
I asked him if it was just my imagination, or was he having more fun than he had 30 years ago -- he said it wasn't my imagination. It looks that way. He ripped his way through a couple sets of his classic soul favorites with a full band that included, at one point, four crackling horns -- two saxes, two trumpets. That's the way it this music was meant to be played. Too much sax always beats too much violence.
Watching the hornmen dip and step together, I had a brief flashback to the first time I saw Fats Domino at the old Twin Coaches night club, and his line of horn players was sharp and snappy. If only Billy's guys had been wearing charcoal and pink....
And there's always something unique about a small, informal club -- whether it's when the singer (Billy Price, remember?) steps down off the stage to testify to the front tables, or the horn players move out and roam the bar, or my personal favorite, when the bartender weaves a big, full trashcan through the middle of the dancers.
First Published October 15, 2007 12:00 am
